The trigger for starting to develop is a signed off Setup Plan, a signed off Delivery Plan and a signed off Release Plan. So you start to develop knowing you have the right setup, you know what you plan to deliver and when you plan to deliver it. By this point, we have completed the SETUP stage and have confirmed our project is ready to develop, we know what benefits we are seeking to deliver and we know when we will deliver them too. Now before we get into detail let us go through a swift bit of terminology so we know precisely which parts of the delivery are going to be delivered and then we have no ambiguity or misunderstanding.

Our ultimate objective is to deliver. We deliver the final delivery. This is the final end point of the project. This will not be a surprise to you. However what may actually be a surprise is what we plan to deliver. We will deliver a deployed solution. However we will also deliver the benefits from the deployed solution.

In the Toolkit, a project delivers a final delivery and the final delivery is the combination of the deployed solution and the realised benefits from the deployed solution. Importantly, a project has not delivered fully until it has uncovered and presented (realised) the benefits promised from the deployed solution.

A project may say it has finished, concluded, ended or completed; it may have shut up shop, gone away, closed down, wrapped up, terminated, ceased, parked, halted or stopped or another related word. However, at this point until it has brought about and revealed the promised benefits, it has not delivered. The Toolkit operates just one success equation.

Successful Final Delivery = Deployed Solution + Realised Benefits

Now that is clear, let us look at the deployed solution. The deployed solution is made up of one or more shipments. The shipments are gradual evolving parts of the deployed solution. The shipments are driven by the Release Plan which is supported by the Delivery Plan. So you see how a solution is derived. We have a delivery date; this specifies when we need our delivery. We develop the delivery by gradually evolving developments.

These developments are released into assessment environments and these developments are termed: releases. Once releases are signed off they are termed deployable releases and these are combined to become shipments, which are deployed to become parts of the solution. These parts of the solution are developed, shipped and deployed in priority order and delivered early to deliver benefits early. More information about the release shipment process is in DELIVER: Release.